Official Rules

NO PURCHASE OR PAYMENT IS NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN. A PURCHASE OR PAYMENT WILL NOT IMPROVE YOUR CHANCES OF WINNING. THIS IS A SKILL-BASED CONTEST. WINNERS ARE DETERMINED BY JUDGING ON THE CRITERIA BELOW, NOT BY CHANCE. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED. These Official Rules ("Rules") govern The Merget Hackathon (the "Contest"). By registering for or submitting an entry to the Contest, you agree to be bound by these Rules and by the decisions of the Sponsor and the judges, which are final and binding in all matters relating to the Contest.

01 Sponsor

The Contest is sponsored and administered by Merget, Inc., 418 Broadway, Unit 7259, Albany, New York 12207, United States ("Merget," "Sponsor," "we," "us"). Questions: [email protected].

02 Eligibility

The Contest is open only to individuals who, as of the date of entry: are 18 years of age or older; are legal residents of one of the fifty (50) United States or the District of Columbia and are physically located in the United States; and have installed the Merget desktop software, hold a Merget account in good standing, and agree to the Merget Terms of Service, Acceptable Use Policy, and Privacy Statement. The following are NOT eligible to win: employees, officers, directors, contractors, and agents of Merget; the judges; and the immediate family members (spouse, parent, child, sibling, and their respective spouses) and household members of each of the foregoing. The Contest is void in U.S. territories and possessions, outside the United States, and wherever prohibited or restricted by law. You are responsible for complying with the laws applicable to you. If you do not meet the eligibility requirements, you may not enter.

03 Contest Period

The Contest begins at 12:00:00 a.m. Eastern Time ("ET") on July 17, 2026 and all Submissions must be received by 11:59:59 p.m. ET on August 7, 2026 (the "Contest Period"). Judging takes place after the Contest Period, and winners are expected to be announced on or about August 14, 2026 (Sponsor may adjust this date). Sponsor's computer is the official time-keeping device for the Contest.

04 No Purchase Necessary; The Product Is Free

No purchase or payment of any kind is necessary to enter or win. The Merget desktop software and v.0. product are available to the public for free, independently of the Contest, and you do not need to enter the Contest to use them. Downloading the software, registering for the Contest, using the product, and submitting an entry are all free.

05 How to Enter

To enter, during the Contest Period you must: Register for the Contest from within the Merget desktop software after signing in to your Merget account. Each such enrollment is a "Registration." Registration is free. Build a video game using the Merget product, using Merget to version the prompts you provide to your AI coding tools (a "Project"). Submit your Project using the Contest submission form, which you can open at any time within the Merget software. On the form you must provide (a) a link to your repository and (b) the name of the single contributor who will receive the prize if your entry is selected to win (a "Submission"). Contributors and prize recipient. A repository may have any number of contributors. If a Submission is selected to win, the prize will be awarded to only one (1) person - the single contributor you name on the submission form as the prize recipient. That person must be individually eligible under Section 2 and must complete winner verification under Section 10. How a prize is shared among contributors is solely your responsibility; Sponsor's only obligation is to the one named recipient. Limits. Only one (1) Submission may be entered per repository, and a given individual may be named as the prize recipient on only one (1) Submission. Submissions must be received by the deadline; Sponsor is not responsible for late, lost, misdirected, incomplete, or inaccessible Submissions.

06 Submission Requirements

Each Submission must: be a functional video game created during the Contest Period and built using the Merget product; demonstrate use of Merget's prompt version-control features - all submitted repositories, including their full prompt version history, will be visible to all judges; include a README with clear setup/run instructions and a short write-up of how you used Merget; be your original work, and you must own or have all rights necessary to everything in the Submission, including any third-party or open-source components, which must be properly licensed and attributed; and comply with the Merget Acceptable Use Policy and Community Guidelines. A Submission must not contain content that is unlawful, infringing, defamatory, obscene, hateful, or otherwise prohibited by the Acceptable Use Policy. Sponsor may disqualify any Submission that violates these Rules or that Sponsor determines, in its sole discretion, to be inappropriate.

07 Judging Criteria and Selection of Winners

All eligible Submissions will be reviewed and scored by a panel of judges consisting of Merget engineers. Submissions will be scored on a 100-point scale using the following criteria (see the separate Judging Rubric for detail): Effective Use of Merget (quality of prompt commit history, demonstrated iteration/improvement, use of Merget features such as branching/experimentation, organization, collaboration, and traceability): 35 points Game Quality & Fun (playability, completeness, fun factor, creativity/originality): 30 points Technical Execution (builds/runs as documented, code quality and organization, technical ambition relative to scope): 20 points Documentation & Presentation (clear README/setup, explanation of how Merget was used, quality of demo/screenshots): 15 points Each Submission's score is the average of the eligible judges' scores. The Submission with the highest score is the Grand Prize winner; the next-highest is second place; the next-highest is third place (as applicable under Section 9). Skill, not chance. Winners are determined solely by the judges' application of the criteria above. The number of entrants does not determine the winners. No element of chance is used to select winners.

08 Tiebreaker Points and Tie Resolution

Tiebreaker Points are used solely to break ties between Submissions that receive equal judged scores under Section 7. They do not affect the initial scoring or ranking of Submissions. Participation in any Tiebreaker activity is entirely optional and is never required to enter, to be eligible, or to win. No Tiebreaker Point is tied to any purchase, payment, or other consideration. During the Contest Period, an entrant may earn Tiebreaker Points for the following verified activities: +1 point for each person you refer who completes a Registration and a valid Submission (maximum +5); +2 points for adding at least 2 eligible collaborators/contributors to your submitted repository; +1 point for following Merget's official account on each of Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and Reddit (maximum +4) - official accounts are linked at https://merget.ai; and +1 point for posting a Contest update on social media with the disclosure hashtag #MergetHackathon (maximum +2). Sponsor may verify any claimed activity and will disregard any activity it cannot verify or that it determines to be fraudulent, automated, or inauthentic. Tie resolution (skill-based). If two or more Submissions are tied after applying Tiebreaker Points, the tie will be resolved by the judging panel by comparing, in order: (1) the Effective Use of Merget sub-score; then (2) the Game Quality & Fun sub-score. No tie will be resolved by random chance.

09 Prizes

The prize structure depends on the total number of Registrations received during the Contest Period: Tier 2 - if 1,000 or more Registrations are received: Grand Prize (1): One (1) one-year subscription to Claude Max 20x. Approximate Retail Value ("ARV"): $2,400. Second Place (1): One (1) one-year subscription to Claude Max 5x. ARV: $1,200. Third Place (1): One (1) one-year subscription to Claude Max 5x. ARV: $1,200. Total ARV (Tier A): $4,800. Tier 1 - if fewer than 1,000 Registrations are received: Grand Prize (1): One (1) one-year subscription to Claude Max 5x. ARV: $1,200. Total ARV (Tier B): $1,200. Prize terms. Prizes are awarded as gift subscriptions redeemed by the winner onto the winner's own Anthropic account using Anthropic's official gift mechanism. Each winner must be at least 18 and must create or hold an eligible Anthropic account and accept Anthropic's applicable terms; the prize is subject to those terms. Prizes are not redeemable for cash and are not transferable or assignable except in Sponsor's discretion. ARVs are based on Anthropic's published gift pricing as of June 2026 and may differ from actual value; no difference will be paid. If a prize (or any portion) becomes unavailable for any reason, Sponsor may substitute a prize of equal or greater value. All prize details not specified here are determined by Sponsor in its sole discretion. Limit one prize per individual or team.

10 Winner Notification and Verification

Potential winners (the contributor named on a winning Submission) will be notified by email at the address associated with the Submission on or about August 14, 2026, and must respond within 5 business days. A potential winner may be required to sign and return, within 7 business days of issuance, (a) a Declaration of Eligibility and Liability Release (which includes a Publicity Release, except where prohibited by law) and (b) a completed IRS Form W-9, as a condition of receiving any prize. If a potential winner cannot be contacted, fails to respond or return required documents within the stated time, is found ineligible, declines a prize, or is otherwise not in compliance with these Rules, the prize may be forfeited and Sponsor may, in its discretion, select an alternate winner (the next highest-scoring eligible Submission).

11 Taxes

All federal, state, and local taxes on any prize are the sole responsibility of the winner. The fair market value of a prize is taxable income to the winner. For any prize at or above the applicable IRS reporting threshold, Sponsor will issue the winner an IRS Form 1099-MISC, and the winner must provide a completed Form W-9 as a condition of receiving the prize. If a winner does not provide a valid taxpayer identification number where required, the prize may be forfeited or subject to backup withholding as required by law.

12 Publicity

Except where prohibited by law, by accepting a prize a winner consents to Sponsor's use of the winner's name, city/state, likeness, Submission, and statements about the Contest for advertising and promotional purposes, in any media, worldwide, without further notice, compensation, or approval. Residents of Tennessee and any other jurisdiction where such consent may not be required as a condition of entry are not required to agree to this Section as a condition of receiving a prize, but acceptance of a prize otherwise constitutes such consent to the extent permitted by law.

13 Intellectual Property; Ownership of Submissions

You retain all ownership rights in your Submission. By entering, you grant Sponsor a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, fully paid, sublicensable, and transferable license to use, reproduce, host, display, perform, modify (for formatting/excerpting), distribute, and create derivative works of your Submission, and to use screenshots, recordings, and descriptions of it, in connection with administering and promoting the Contest and Merget. You represent and warrant that: (a) the Submission is your original work; (b) you own or have all rights necessary to grant this license; (c) the Submission, and Sponsor's use of it as permitted here, does not and will not infringe or violate any third party's intellectual property, privacy, publicity, or other rights; and (d) any third-party or open-source materials in the Submission are used in compliance with their licenses and are properly attributed. You are responsible for choosing and complying with any open-source license you apply to your repository.

14 Privacy

Information you provide in connection with the Contest is collected and used by Sponsor to administer the Contest (including verifying eligibility, communicating with entrants, selecting and announcing winners, and fulfilling prizes) and is otherwise handled in accordance with the Merget Privacy Statement. Sponsor will not use Contest entrant information for unrelated marketing without your consent. California and other state-law privacy rights described in the Privacy Statement apply.

15 AI-Assisted Content

The Merget product and the AI coding tools you may use are AI-assisted and their outputs are provided "as is." You are solely responsible for reviewing, testing, and validating your Submission and for ensuring it complies with these Rules and does not infringe any third party's rights. Judging is conducted by human judges.

16 General Conditions; Reservation of Rights

Sponsor reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to: disqualify any entrant who tampers with the Contest, violates these Rules or any Merget policy, or acts in a disruptive or unfair manner; and to modify, suspend, extend, or terminate the Contest (in whole or in part) if fraud, technical failure, insufficient eligible entries, or any other factor beyond Sponsor's reasonable control impairs the integrity or proper functioning of the Contest, in which case Sponsor may determine winners from eligible, non-affected Submissions received up to the time of the impairment. Any attempt to deliberately damage the Contest or undermine its legitimate operation may be a violation of law, and Sponsor reserves the right to seek remedies and damages to the fullest extent permitted. Sponsor's failure to enforce any term does not waive that term.

17 Release and Limitation of Liability

By entering, you release and hold harmless Sponsor and its parent, affiliates, and their respective officers, directors, employees, contractors, and agents (the "Released Parties") from any and all liability, claims, or damages arising out of or relating to your participation in the Contest or the acceptance, use, or misuse of any prize, to the fullest extent permitted by law. The Released Parties are not responsible for: technical, hardware, software, network, or other failures; lost, late, incomplete, or misdirected entries; or any error in the administration of the Contest. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE RELEASED PARTIES WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations, so some may not apply to you.

18 Disputes; Governing Law

These Rules are governed by the laws of the State of New York, without regard to conflict-of-laws principles. Except where prohibited, you agree that any dispute arising out of or relating to the Contest will be resolved individually, without resort to any form of class action, in the state or federal courts located in Albany County, New York, and you consent to personal jurisdiction there.

19 Platform Disclaimers

The Contest is not sponsored, endorsed, administered by, or associated with Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Reddit, Meta, Facebook, X (Twitter), YouTube, or any other social-media platform. Any information you provide is provided to Sponsor, not to any platform. You must comply with the applicable platform's terms when participating.

20 Anthropic Disclaimer

The Contest is not sponsored, endorsed, administered by, or affiliated with Anthropic, PBC. "Claude" and "Claude Max" are trademarks of Anthropic, PBC, used here only to identify the prize. Anthropic is not a sponsor of the Contest and is not responsible for it.

21 Social-Media Disclosure (FTC)

If you post about the Contest on social media - including to earn Tiebreaker Points - you must clearly and conspicuously disclose your participation, for example by placing #MergetHackathon at the beginning of your post. Do not make false or misleading statements about Merget or its products.

22 Winners List

A list of winners will be posted on the Merget website and within the Merget software after the Contest concludes, and will remain available for a reasonable period. You may also request the list by emailing [email protected] with the subject line "Merget Hackathon Winners List."